


Anatomy of Apology

by quandong_crumble



Series: I am come home [7]
Category: Iron Man (Movies)
Genre: Anal Sex, Forgiveness, M/M, Misunderstandings, Oral Sex, Reunion Sex, Reunions, Secret Relationship, Secrets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-07
Updated: 2014-06-11
Packaged: 2018-02-03 17:41:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1753247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quandong_crumble/pseuds/quandong_crumble
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>There was a time, once, when Tony felt the tension in his spine drain away as soon as the latch on the hotel room door clicked shut. A shut door meant they could relax, that they didn’t have to hide anymore, they could reach out to each other, touch they way they only had the freedom to do in private. Love they way they only had the freedom to do in private. Not today, though.</em>
</p>
<p>Rhodey's home, and Tony wants nothing more than to welcome him back with open arms, but the past months are weighing on him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Tony

**Author's Note:**

> I'm so sorry you had to wait so long for this fic. It's been a monster to write (my writing self confidence disappeared for months).
> 
> Big thank you to [Not_Applicable](http://archiveofourown.org/users/not_applicable), who looked over the first half of this chapter and offered some great encouragement and advice.
> 
> As always, my writing would simply not exist without [Saral's](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Saral_Hylor/pseuds/Saral_Hylor) cheerleading. You owe everything in this fic to her.

There was a time, once, when Tony felt the tension in his spine drain away as soon as the latch on the hotel room door clicked shut. A shut door meant they could relax, that they didn’t have to hide anymore, they could reach out to each other, touch they way they only had the freedom to do in private. Love they way they only had the freedom to do in private. Not today, though. The tension he can feel stiffening his back and shoulders gets worse, until he feels like his bones have to crack with the pressure. Rhodey turns to look at him with that same relieved smile as always, made strange by the new thin, tired lines of his face. Something he saw in the war zone aged him, made him seem more than just twenty-two. Maybe it was just being at war itself. It’s just one more barrier between them, and Tony feels even more like a child in comparison. He should be happy. He is, and he’s relieved that Roberta accepted his offer of hotel rooms so that they wouldn’t have to drive back to Philadelphia tonight. She gave him a little knowing smile when he booked the suite, and then excused herself to catch up with a friend for a coffee, promising to be back in time for dinner. Giving them the time alone that Tony would normally be excited for but his stomach hasn’t stopped churning since he started waiting in the airport. They’ve been limited to letters for so many months, unable to write anything that could give away their relationship, and so much has been left unsaid and un-addressed. The fight they had just before Rhodey left hangs over his head like a guillotine, and he feels like the blade will drop at any moment, that Rhodey will remember that they broke up. That he doesn’t owe Tony anything.

Or worse, that somehow he’ll know what a mess Tony was without him, and be disgusted.

“You’re thinking too loudly,” Rhodey says. He looks striking against the white on white of the suite’s living room, and Tony’s eyes can’t look anywhere else. He’s magnetic. “I can hear it from here.”

Tony manages to give him a strained smile and steps forward into Rhodey’s waiting arms. He’s warm, solid, and smells so good. Tony presses his nose into the skin of Rhodey’s neck just above his collar and just clings and breathes.

“I missed you too,” Rhodey murmurs into his ear. “I missed you so much, Tone.”

Tony hears the break in his voice and pulls back to look him in the eye. It’s going to take some time to get used to the new weariness there, but for now he can at least try to erase the tight lines around Rhodey’s mouth, soothe away the last of the desert on his skin. He can put aside his own concerns, be unselfish, and give him this. Casual sex between friends, comfort, make up sex—whatever it is doesn’t matter, he can give him this.

“Missed you, honey bear,” he whispers against Rhodey’s lips, and then he chases the words with a kiss.

He keeps it soft and chaste, questioning at first. Asking permission. Rhodey’s grip shifts, one hand sliding down to his hip and the other coming up to press between his shoulder blades, holding him in place as he takes control of the kiss and heats it up. There’s something desperate about the way that he slides his tongue against Tony’s lips until Tony opens to him, taking him in, and grabs fistfuls of Rhodey’s shirt to hold him close. The noise that escapes from his throat when Rhodey’s teeth catch his bottom lip is positively embarrassing. Tony pulls away for a breath and then leans back in, teasing with quick, nibbling kisses that tug on Rhodey’s full bottom lip, pulling away occasionally to check if that haunted look is gone from Rhodey’s eyes.

It isn’t, though his pupils are dilated and his breathing is a little ragged after the kiss. It might be a little less pronounced, though. Tony redoubles his efforts, determined to wipe that look away. He flicks his tongue against Rhodey’s open mouth but never quite pressing in, teasing and leading until Rhodey steers him back against the wall, cushioning his head with a gentle hand, and pins him in place with the hard weight of his body. He’s held still as Rhodey kisses him deep, slow and hard, pressing bruises into his lips and his tongue into his mouth.

“Bed,” Tony groans. “Bed, now.”

“Yes,” Rhodey breathes.

Tony shoves clear of the wall and they stumble together towards the bedroom, still tangled in each other. Tony shrugs out of his jacket and manages to drop it over the back of a chair on the way, pressing his lips to the stubble on Rhodey’s neck until they stagger and clatter against the closed door and he has to scrabble for the handle to open it. He adds teeth, taking advantage of how Rhodey’s dark skin and day-old beard scruff will hide the bruise he’s sucking into his neck as Rhodey guides him backwards through the doorway. When his legs hit mattress he topples backwards, dragging Rhodey down by his shirt.

“Quit that,” Rhodey says, but his eyes are finally smiling along with his mouth. The haunted look is mostly buried under his good humour and the vaguely predatory look in his eyes as he pins Tony to the bed and drags his tie loose. He starts franticly tugging on the buttons of Tony’s shirt while Tony gets his fingers under Rhodey’s tee and lifts, exposing chiselled abs.

“Oh, these are new,” Tony says, running his fingers over the muscles. He suddenly feels very self-conscious about his own body and the extra weight he’s been carrying around his butt and belly since he injured his knee.

“No they’re not,” Rhodey says. He finally gets Tony’s shirt unbuttoned and tugs it open.

“Well, they’re a lot… musclier than I remember,” Tony mutters. He cuts off his next retort with a gasp as Rhodey’s mouth latches onto his collarbone with bruising force. He arches up into the suction. “Ah! Holy shit!”

Tony rakes his nails up Rhodey’s back, up under the hem of his tee shirt as far as he can reach, and tries to squirm—unsure whether towards or away from the exquisite torment of Rhodey’s mouth—but Rhodey’s straddling his thighs and gripping his shoulders, effectively pinning him.

“You’re still wearing too many clothes,” Tony says. He tries to pull Rhodey’s tee shirt off but his reach is limited by the way Rhodey’s holding him down.

Rhodey lifts his mouth away from Tony’s chest with a wet sucking sound, revealing the beginnings of a truly impressive hickey. “Slow down. I’ve been fantasising about this for months, I want to make it last as long as I can. I want to do _everything_ I’ve been thinking about.”

Tony feels like he’s missed a step, half tripping and struggling to keep up. He looks up at Rhodey, at his lips—a little puffy from kissing, from the hickeys—and at his eyes—shining with life that simply wasn’t there when he got off the plane. His heart hurts with how much he loves this man, an ache that travels higher up into his throat and he knows that if he says something his voice will be harsh and wrecked with it. So he stays quiet, just tugs Rhodey back down as best he can and tries to put everything he doesn’t know how to say into the kiss. 

“Like that,” Rhodey murmurs when they break apart again. “I thought about that almost every day. I missed kissing you.”

“I missed kissing you,” Tony repeats, with the weight of his heart behind the words. His voice only wavers a little.

Rhodey topples off to the side to lie next to Tony, his groin pressed to Tony’s hip and one leg still thrown across Tony’s thighs. Propped up on one elbow, his face is so close Tony would barely have to lift his head to kiss him. Instead he brings his hand up and trails his fingertips across Rhodey’s cheek, from nose to temple, then down to caress his jaw. Rhodey’s eyes flutter closed and he leans into the touch. His skin is drier than before, probably from the long flight, or maybe from the desert air, and even darker from his time in the sun. Feather light, Tony feels out the bumps of a few ingrown hairs on Rhodey’s chin, explores the corners of his mouth, his plump lips that nip and catch at his fingertips. Rhodey’s hand is a still weight on his belly, fingers occasionally twitching as he seems content to just lie there and be petted. Tony slides his hand up Rhodey’s jaw again, feeling the stubble prickle his palm, and strokes his thumb over his eyebrow, then over the tiny new lines at the corner of his eye. From squinting at the sun, probably.

“Remembering my face?” Rhodey teases. 

“I could never forget it.”

Tony barely has the time to realise how ridiculously sappy that sounded before Rhodey’s on top of him again, pressing him into the mattress. His kiss, though, is slow and thorough, his tongue sliding easily through Tony’s parted lips to tease with flicks at the roof of his mouth. Tony sucks gently, drawing him closer, until Rhodey pulls away and leaves him breathless and panting. And achingly hard.

“If you keep kissing me like that I’m going to come in my pants,” Tony moans. “I haven’t done that since I was a teenager.”

“You’re twenty one,” Rhodey says. “It won’t take you long to recover.”

“If you’re so sure of that, then why not help me take the edge off?” Tony says, jerking his hips so that his erection presses against Rhodey’s thigh, as if the other man could mistake his meaning. 

Rhodey rolls his hips on retaliation, sliding his thigh over Tony’s groin and creating delicious, tormenting friction. “No, I like you better with the edge still on. You get so... wriggly.”

“I do not,” Tony says, not even bothering to try to hide the way he’s squirming to press his cock against Rhodey. He can’t really get the leverage he wants, not with his feet still dangling off the edge of the mattress and Rhodey doing his best to hold him still.

“All wriggly,” Rhodey repeats. He slides to the side again, leaving his leg across Tony’s hips to pin him, and steadies him with a gentle hand to his face. Tony turns into it and presses a kiss to Rhodey’s palm.

“Okay,” he says, “we can go at your pace.”

Rhodey’s smile is worth the growing ache in his groin. Rhodey’s smile is worth a whole lot more than that, and when he’s looking down at Tony like this—eyes soft and loving, fingertips gently teasing—well, Tony could lie still forever and just bask in this. Rhodey’s fingers trail gently down from Tony’s smooth chin, over his throat, and rest for a moment in that little divot between his collarbones while Rhodey leans in for a slow kiss. Tony tries not to squirm as the calloused fingers continue down his chest, over his sternum, completely ignoring his nipples. He freezes when they reach his belly, fingertips sinking ever so slightly into the soft flesh there, and waits for the inevitable comment about the change.

It doesn’t come. Rhodey’s fingers don’t even pause in their journey, trailing down his belly—one flat fingertip caressing his navel and sending a jolt of confusing sensation both up and down his spine—and stopping at the waistband of his slacks. There, Rhodey fondles the edge of the fabric for a moment before his fingers slide upwards again. He pauses at Tony’s navel, traces around the outside with the edge of his fingernail, and strokes the little nub of flesh with a flat fingertip. Tony can’t decide whether or not it tickles, but the jolt it sends through him feels some sort of amazing, and he writhes into it. 

“Interesting,” Rhodey says. “This one guy in my unit said that he could get his girlfriend off just with his tongue in her belly button. We all thought he was pulling our legs. But...”

He trails off and wriggles down the bed so that his head is level with Tony’s stomach, and pins his hips with one forearm. 

“What are you– Rhodey, no!”

Too late, Rhodey sets his weight so Tony can’t get the leverage to buck him off, and draws a circle around Tony’s navel with his tongue.

“No, stop, that tickles!” Tony shoves at his shoulder, but it’s half-hearted at best. Rhodey’s tongue presses straight onto his belly button and that’s it, the electric jolt again. It shoots down his spine and adds to the heat already pooling in his groin, and he feels his cock twitch against the confines of his pants. “Oh Jesus, don’t stop. Please don’t stop.”

Rhodey’s laugh tickles against his stomach, but his tongue doesn’t stop weaving patterns in and around his navel. It feels like there’s a bubble of laughter caught in his chest, and a live wire running from his belly to his balls. Tony grabs a handful of Rhodey’s shirt with one hand and scrabbles at the bedspread with the other, and arches his back against the bed, still not sure how to classify the feeling but knowing that it falls somewhere between ‘amazing’ and ‘too much’. He can hear the noises he’s making, high pitched and breathy, but can’t make himself stop.

“Too much,” he pants. “Rhodey, you gotta stop. I’m–”

Rhodey stops, and all Tony can hear is the rush of his own heartbeat in his ears for a second until he calms down. There’s a frisson up his spine almost like an aftershock, but he’s still achingly hard.

“Were you really going to...?” Rhodey says. “Just from that?”

“I don’t think so,” Tony says. “It felt weird, amazing weird, and it was overwhelming, but if I’m not going to come untouched with your dick in my ass, I doubt your tongue on my belly button’s going to do it.”

“You did get lovely and wriggly though,” Rhodey says. He pauses to press one more kiss to Tony’s navel, then trails his chin up his stomach, scraping the skin with his rough stubble. “And noisy.”

Tony struggles against the tickling scrape and manages to knock Rhodey to the side. He follows through, rolling over to pin him to the bed and pressing his lips to Rhodey’s smile. “My turn now,” he says into the kiss.

Rhodey laughs up at him, reaches up and frames his face with both hands. “I love you, you know.”

Tony feels that stuttered, missed-step plunge in his gut again. He has to close his eyes and just breathe, breathe past the lump on his throat and through the hot prickle in his sinuses warning of tears. It’s not the first time Rhodey’s said it, of course, but it’s just to different from the last time, when Rhodey had spat with all the venom he could muster _I love you, Tony, but I don’t like you a whole lot right now._ It had been just after saying that, that Rhodey had put his fist through the wall of the hotel room.

Tony ducks his head quickly to hide his expression, pulling free of Rhodey’s grip he drags his tee shirt up under his armpits, and kisses his way down that broad, muscled chest. He pauses when he feels the hard bone of Rhodey’s sternum change into the softer muscle of his belly, and nuzzles the skin. The fine hair there tickles his cheek, and Rhodey’s abdominal muscles jump and twitch as he continues his way down towards the waistband of his trousers. Tony bites at the fabric over the button, rubs his chin against Rhodey’s clothed erection, and feels it twitch even through the thick drill. He thinks about trying to undo the button with his teeth, but he’s on a clumsy angle and the button is stiff, so he backs off further, until his legs are mostly hanging off the bed. Lying in the vee of Rhodey’s legs, Tony teases at the fly of his pants, tugging at the fabric and flicking at the zipper.

“Now who’s the tease?” Rhodey says.

Tony presses the heel of his hand against Rhodey’s bulge again and flicks open the button of his pants. He leans forward and grabs the zipper between his teeth and looks up Rhodey’s body until he meets the wide dark eyes staring back at him. Rhodey’s mouth is slightly open, the edges twitched up in a smile, and the look in his eyes is as soft and sincere as his earlier words. Their eyes lock as Tony eases the zip down. He wriggles his way down the bed until he slides off the end, and stands up.

“Take them off, I’ll be right back,” he says. “I left all the goodies in my jacket.”

“Hurry back,” Rhodey grumbles behind him as he walks, a little unsteady, out the room.

Tony’s jacket’s where he left it, half hanging off the arm of the overstuffed leather couch. He digs into the inner pocket and fishes out the strip of condoms and the sachets of lube, and pauses. They’d done away with condoms before Rhodey left but now, well, Tony hadn’t exactly been celibate in his absence. He’d been safe with Jenny—she’d insisted—but he hadn’t been so cautious with the pop star. Danny or whatever his name was had claimed to be clean, but Tony hadn’t exactly had a chance to get tested since.

“Hey, you get lost out there or something?” Rhodey calls from the bedroom.

“Getting impatient?” Tony asks. He fixes a smile in his face and returns to the bedroom, plastic and foil packets crinkling in his fist.

Rhodey’s lying in the middle of the bed, propped up on the pillows. He’s naked, brown skin extra dark against the bright white of the sheets. He has tan lines Tony hadn’t noticed, faint lines delineated at the wrist, biceps and shoulders, and a vee over his collarbone, just below his throat. Tony toes off his shoes and socks and crawls onto the bed.

“Miss me?” He asks, and he’s not just teasing about Rhodey’s wait for him to return to the bedroom.

“C’mere,” Rhodey says, reaching out to him. “Why aren’t you naked?”

“Gonna let you unwrap me in a minute,” Tony murmurs. He crawls closer, but instead of cuddling up at Rhodey’s side he nudges his legs apart and settles between them, his face level with Rhodey’s still-mostly-erect cock. Rhodey has such a beautiful cock, thick, dark and cut, standing up out of the short nest of pubic hair like some kind of bizarre offering to Tony’s dirty mind. He rubs his lips against the head, peeks his tongue out to lap at the underside a little, and smiles against the smooth, yielding skin when he hears Rhodey’s breathing change.

Rhodey’s so good at saying _I love you_ and making him feel the heavy meaning behind each one of those three words, hot like brands on his lungs, stealing his breath. Tony’s not so great at saying it back. The words feel flimsy in his mouth and sound thin and empty in the air, whether said quietly or loudly. This, though, he can put every bit of himself that doesn’t fit in those three words into this. He adjusts the way his weight is distributed on his elbows so that he can get one hand up to wrap around the shaft of Rhodey’s cock while he takes just the head into his mouth. Careful to shield the sensitive flesh from his teeth he sucks gently and swirls his tongue the best he can around the tip.

This he can do, this he’s good at. Not words, but the action of taking Rhodey’s cock in, a bit at a time, until it’s nudging at the back of his throat. He sucks harder, hollowing his cheeks, and pulls back so that he can bob his head, twisting his grip around what doesn’t fit into his mouth. It’s like there’s a live wire connecting them, so when Tony flicks his tongue hard against the slit and Rhodey moans, it goes straight down Tony’s spine. He pulls off with a quiet pop just as his jaw begins to cramp—too soon, he usually lasts longer but he’s out of practice. Rhodey’s propped himself up on one elbow to watch with dark, lustful eyes, so Tony makes a show of wiping away the spit around his lips.

“Can I keep going, or are you too close?”

“Keep going? Please?” Rhodey says and Tony nearly laughs at how polite he is. He takes a moment to find one of the little sachets of lube, already warm from where it has been trapped between his belly and the bed, and tears it open to coat his fingers. Rising up onto his knees for a better angle, he nudges Rhodey’s thighs wider apart and then takes his cock in his mouth again. He doesn’t tease, just sucks the thick cock into his mouth and this time doesn’t stop when it nudges at his throat. Instead he swallows around the pressure of the head to keep his gag reflex down, and keeps going until his nose is pressed against Rhodey’s pubes.

“Oh, fuck,” Rhodey moans.

Tony pulls off and grins at him. “Yeah, well, we’ll get to that. But I want to do this first.”

He swallows Rhodey’s cock again, not quite as far this time, and bobs his head up and down slowly. No need to get Rhodey on edge too quickly, he wants to draw this out as long as possible even though his own cock is hard and aching. He presses one slick finger against Rhodey’s asshole, feels him flinch slightly, and just rests it there, massaging the puckered muscle gently. Keeping a steady rhythm on Rhodey’s cock, he waits until he feels him relax, and then eases his middle finger inside.

Rhodey gasps and swears, and bucks hard, forcing his cock into Tony’s throat. Tony chokes and pulls back.

“Sorry, sorry,” Rhodey says.

“It’s okay,” Tony tells him. “This _is_ okay, yeah?”

Rhodey squirms, clenching down on Tony’s finger. “Yeah,” he says, a little breathless. “This is okay. You can top, if you want.”

It’s a tempting offer—it’s not like Tony tops him often, he barely wants to when he could have Rhodey’s dick up his ass instead—but right now he’s craving what’s familiar.

“No, that’s okay,” he says. “I just want to give you your best blow job yet.”

“Keep it up and it will be my shortest blow job yet,” Rhodey says. He gasps as Tony twists his finger, then curls it to just brush his prostate.

“Well,” Tony says. He licks the head of Rhodey’s penis and then grins up at him wickedly. “You’re only twenty two, it will hardly take you long to recover.”

“Longer than I wanna wait,” he mutters. Tony dips his head to lick at his penis again and Rhodey relaxes into it. “You’d better stop when I warn you, that’s all.”

“Count on it,” Tony says. He doesn’t waste any more time, opening his mouth wide and ducking his head to take Rhodey’s penis back in. He loves the slide of it in his mouth, the way he has to stretch his jaw around it, the clean salt taste of his precome. He bobs his head, taking Rhodey further and further in with each slide, and curls his finger to provide gentle pressure against his prostate.

Rhodey’s hips buck in little aborted thrusts, and Tony backs off a bit. Rhodey’s hand comes up to stroke through his hair and cup his cheek. It doesn’t take long for him to start tugging on Tony’s hair, urging him to back off. 

“Stop, Tony. Jeez.”

Tony lets his cock go with an obscene pop of broken suction and slides his finger free of Rhodey’s ass, wiping it on the sheets. “Already?”

“Yes, already,” Rhodey says. “You’re amazing at that, you know.”

“Mmm hmm,” Tony agrees. “Genius, MIT graduate, but my real talent is sucking cock.”

“Shut up,” Rhodey says back, with a smile in his voice. He levers himself up onto his elbows and looks at Tony with hooded come-hither eyes. “Get undressed for me?”

Tony pushes up off the bed and saunters around the mattress, swinging his hips in a way he hopes is seductive. He pops the buttons open on his cuffs, one at a time, then rolls his shoulders so that the shirt slips free. Rhodey rolls towards him and sits up, then slides his hands around Tony’s swaying hips and up his sides. Tony lifts his arms and sucks in his stomach, keeping his hips moving as Rhodey’s big hands trail up to his ribs then around to his chest. Calloused fingers frame his nipples but don’t touch, and then slide back down his belly to his belt and tug it open. Rhodey makes quick work of his fly as well, and then he’s pulling his pants and briefs down over the swell of his ass and freeing his erection. Rhodey pulls him close, wrapping his arms around Tony’s hips, and rests his forehead against Tony’s belly for just a moment, mumbling something. 

“What was that?” Tony asks. 

“Just can’t believe how lucky I am, sometimes,” Rhodey whispers. He’s looking up at Tony, eyes shining with happiness, and Tony has to look away. Rhodey’s not the lucky one, Tony is. Lucky to have someone who can look at him that way, look up at him like he’s worth something, like he’s someone special.

“Not as lucky as me,” he deflects. “And I’m about to get luckier. Come on, Rhodey, don’t be a tease.”

Rhodey laughs and leans back, towing Tony onto the bed. Tony kicks his pants off and crawls onto the bed, straddling him, and bends down to kiss him. They shuffle around until Rhodey’s head is back on the pillows and Tony’s straddling his hips and pressing the condoms and foil lube sachets into Rhodey’s open hand.

“Condoms?” Rhodey’s voice is confused. “Really?”

“Hey, I just don’t want to be sitting at dinner with your come sliding out my ass when I’m asking your mom to pass the salt.” Tony tries to keep his voice light.

“Yeah, okay,” Rhodey says. He hooks his hand around Tony’s neck and pulls him in for a kiss. Tony goes willingly, melting against Rhodey’s chest and letting Rhodey roll him over. 

Rhodey kneels between Tony’s thighs and tangles his hands with Tony’s, leaning in to kiss him. Tony chases his lips, mouth just open, but Rhodey pulls back before he’s satisfied, freeing his hands and grabbing one of the pillows from the headboard. 

“Up,” he says, breathless, and taps Tony’s hip. Tony lifts his hips for Rhodey to slide the pillow under. Rhodey sits back on his heels and gazes down at Tony’s sprawled body from under heavy eyelids. He scrabbles at the bed for a moment, feeling around to find the lube that he’d dropped without taking his eyes off Tony, and comes up quickly with two sachets. He tears one open and it rips the wrong way, spilling all down his hand. 

“These are stupid,” he grumbles, tilting his hand so that the lube will run down onto his fingers. “Should have brought a bottle.”

He doesn’t seem to expect Tony to answer, instead rubbing his fingers together and lowering his hand, and then Tony’s not really capable of answering. Rhodey used his free hand—and oh, that’s just a little bit slick too—to hold Tony’s cock out of the way while his other presses firmly against his perineum and trails down to his asshole.

Tony gasps as one slick finger breaches him, unconsciously thrusting up into Rhodey’s hand, and Rhodey takes it as a hint, starting to pump both hands at the same time, and Tony’s torn between grinding down on the finger in his ass that’s only occasionally touching his prostate, and thrusting up into the hand around his cock. He’s practically writhing on the bed, hips moving in little jerks, and he can hear himself whimpering just a little as Rhodey slides a second finger inside him. He pumps and scissors them, slowly stretching the ring of muscle, and Tony feels his body relaxing, accepting the intrusion, letting Rhodey into him. 

“Fuck, Rhodey,” he moans. “Feel so good. No, wait, don’t stop.”

Rhodey does stop, though, stilling his fingers and taking his hand off Tony’s cock. Tony forcibly focuses his eyes, and see’s Rhodey struggling one-handed with the second lube sachet. He manages to rip the corner open with his teeth without spilling everywhere, and then Tony feels the cool lube sliding down behind his balls. He hisses with surprise and clenches down on Rhodey’s fingers, and Rhodey rubs gently on his perineum until he relaxes again. He feels Rhodey’s fingers pump in and out and then a third finger is pressing in, and Rhodey curls them to bump over his prostate.

Tony moans. “Oh god, Rhodey, fuck me already.”

There’s a stretch, Rhodey scissoring his fingers apart, and Tony bucks his hips up into the feeling. His thighs are trembling and he can feel the sweat sticking tendrils of his hair to his forehead. Rhodey twists his fingers again.

“Please, Rhodey,” he begs, because he really is ready, he needs Rhodey’s cock now. But also because of the way it makes Rhodey’s mouth curl up in a smug little smile. “I’m ready. I’m so ready. Please.”

Rhodey’s mouth does curl up at the edges, but he turns it into a smile rather than a smirk. “Okay, yeah. It’s just... You’re so beautiful like this, you know?”

“Don’t make me beg more,” Tony says.

“I won’t,” Rhodey promises. He twists his fingers one last time, pulls them free and wipes them on Tony’s thigh. His other hand scrabbles in the sheets again, searching for the condom. He finds it after a moment, and struggles to tear it with slick fingers before the packet finally gives way.

There’s the faint snap-squelch of Rhodey rolling the condom on, and then he braces one hand on the inside of Tony’s thigh and uses the other to guide his cock into Tony’s ass. Tony gasps as the thick head of Rhodey’s dick breaches him with the first push, and then Rhodey’s rocking his hips in little thrusts, inching further in each time, until his hips are flush with the back of Tony’s thighs and Tony feels full, stretched in a way that he hasn’t felt for too long. He lets his head fall back onto the pillows and breathes in shallow pants until he’s a little more used to the sensation.

Rhodey leans forward and braces one hand on the mattress next to Tony’s ribs, and rocks his hips in a careful withdrawal. The long, slow slide sends a shower of sparks straight up Tony’s spine. He shudders and reaches for Rhodey, to pull him close. Rhodey catches his hand and presses it back down into the bed, their fingers twined together, and then he’s leaning forward, pressing wet kisses to Tony’s jaw and neck as he starts the long, slow thrust back in.

“Oh fuck, faster,” Tony moans.

Rhodey laughs, clear and sweet. “God I missed being inside you.”

Tony laughs too, because it’s not sentimental, not really, but the way Rhodey says it makes him feel warm in his chest. He hooks his leg around Rhodey’s hips and tries to draw him in faster, harder, and brings his free hand up to clutch at Rhodey’s shoulder. Rhodey takes the hint and speeds up his thrusts, adding power to the snap of his hips.

Tony moans again, wordless, and rocks his hips up to meet each of Rhodey’s thrusts. Rhodey’s cock skates across his prostate each time, and Tony bucks, back bowing and arching.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he whines. “Rhodey!”

Rhodey grips his hand tighter and kisses the words out of his mouth. His hips stutter, his rhythm lost as he catches Tony’s bottom lip between his teeth and tugs gently. Tony slides his hand from Rhodey’s shoulder around to cup the back of his head, fingers scratching through the regulation length hair there, and pulls him closer. They break for a moment, just breathing each other’s air while Rhodey makes slow circles with his hips.

“I want to ride you,” Tony whispers.

“What?” Rhodey says. “Yeah, yeah, of course.”

He kisses across Tony’s face and down his neck. Tony gasps as Rhodey’s teeth find purchase on the juncture of his neck and shoulder and then the breath is all but punched out of him as Rhodey thrusts his hips forward again, quick and rough. Tony rolls his hips up to meet him as Rhodey bucks into him once, twice, three more times before he pulls back suddenly, panting.

“Did you...?” Tony asks. It’s uncomfortable—he isn’t ready to be empty, unsatisfied.

“Nearly,” Rhodey says. He smiles sheepishly. “Sorry, any longer and I was going to. I didn’t want it to be over too fast.”

Tony can’t help but grin at that. He’s never been able to complain about Rhodey being too fast. “So, you’re still good to go?”

Rhodey leans back over him, hands either side of Tony’s head, and kisses him, slow and sweet. Tony can feel Rhodey’s hard cock pressing against his ass, which answers that question. He pushes at Rhodey’s shoulder. “Come on, roll over. I want to ride you.”

Tony doesn’t give him time to try and shuffle closer to the middle of the bed when Rhodey rolls off of him. He just follows, rolling over and planting his knee on the other side of Rhodey, on the very edge of the bed, straddling him. Rhodey’s hands come up straight away, one sliding up his thigh and the other curving around his hip. He’s not holding him still, just feeling him there, and Tony rises up on his knees until he can reach behind and guide Rhodey’s cock to his ass once more, and then sinks back down, taking him in in one smooth movement. He doesn’t need time to adjust now, open and aching for it, so he begins with the smooth roll of his hips that he knows drives Rhodey wild.

He’s not disappointed. Rhodey’s eyes flutter shut and his head falls back against the pillow. Tony feels his whole body shifting as Rhodey braces his feet against the bed behind him, and then Rhodey’s hands tighten on his waist and he starts bumping his hips upwards to meet him as Tony grinds down. Tony leans back a little further and lets Rhodey’s hands balance him. Rhodey’s cock scrapes over Tony’s prostate, and Tony gasps and clenches down.

It doesn’t take long for him to feel the heat building in his belly, not like this, with Rhodey feeling impossibly large on this angle. One hand creeps to his neglected cock and he grips it loosely, slick precome easing the friction.

“I’m close,” Tony says.

One of Rhodey’s hands joins his. “Me too.”

Tony speeds up, practically bouncing on Rhodey’s cock, and Rhodey speeds their hands up to match. He can feel the muscles in his thighs and belly tightening, tingling almost, and the drag of Rhodey’s cock across his prostate, just out of sync with the drag of their joined hands on his cock and all the more perfect for it. His muscles lock tight with a last stutter of his hips and his vision goes white as he comes hard, spilling over their joined hands. Rhodey stiffens and stills beneath him, their breaths harsh in the silence of the room.

Tony doesn’t want to move, wants to capture this feeling forever, this half-out-of-his-skin, tingling with pleasure sense of peace. He shifts, separating where their skin has been glued together with mixed sweat, and eases up off of Rhodey. He winces when Rhodey’s cock pulls free, his body clinging to the sensation of being filled and giving it up only grudgingly, and rolls to one side, pressing close to Rhodey’s prone body. Rhodey rolls onto his side and Tony meets him halfway, panting in between their kisses.

“That,” he murmurs when they pull apart again, “was truly amazing make up sex.”

Rhodey freezes half way through tying off the condom, the little latex bag of semen dangling absurdly from his fingers. Tony keeps his eyes fixed on Rhodey’s hands and feels the tension from earlier return to his spine. He’s messed up, again, he should have just stayed quiet and enjoyed the afterglow.

“Make up sex?” Rhodey finally says, and his voice sounds as small as Tony has ever heard it. “We never… did we break up?”

Tony swallows the sudden hard lump in his throat, sharp as razor blades that shred his voice. “When– before you left. When we fought in that hotel room and–”

It’s a relief when Rhodey cuts him off. “Oh, Tone. It was just a fight. Not every fight is a break up.”

His voice is so gentle, and when he leans over to press a kiss to Tony’s unresponsive mouth Tony nearly recoils. He feels so dirty, duplicitous, he should have talked to Rhodey first. Should have sorted all this out _before_ he tried to kiss the desert from his skin and welcome him home. The words burst from his mouth unbidden, like he can’t help but confess, like Rhodey’s kindness has dragged them from him. Loud and ragged in the quiet hotel room.

“Then I cheated on you. Twice.”


	2. Jim

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rhodey tries to cope with Tony's confession.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _So, a reader has contacted me privately to point out that this isn't a satisfying conclusion, and that Rhodey is OOC as heckle in this chapters, and I 1000% agree. I am, however, leaving this chapter here for the time being, with this note up, due to a pathalogical fear of leaving a published work unfinished, as a bit of an apology to people who read the first chapter and hated the cliffhanger, and as a reminder to myself to fix it, eventually._
> 
> _So, read this chapter if you like, but don't get too attached to it because I will be revising it sometime before the end of the year. I need to get another couple of projects completed first so I can look at this with fresh eyes and do a decent job on the rewrite._
> 
> _Sorry to anyone who came to this chapter looking for a proper resolution._

“Then I cheated on you. Twice.”

The words slam into Jim like a punch to the chest and leave him reeling. For a moment his mind absolutely refuses to accept the confession. Tony’s not a cheater, he never has been. He looks at Tony now, lying next to him on the bed with sweat and come drying on his skin, and Tony won’t meet his eyes. He keeps his eyes firmly down, and he’s biting at his bottom lip like he’s punishing it for letting the words out. Tony opens his mouth like he’s going to speak, closes it, and opens it again.

“Shit, Tony,” Jim says before Tony can say anything more. He sits up, turns his back on Tony and just stares at his hands. The condom still dangles from his fingers, as much a reminder of what they just did as the dying feeling of languid bliss. He takes a deep, shuddering breath, and another when the first doesn’t seem to contain enough oxygen. He’d felt so good, only moments ago. Relaxed, sated, happy—he was home, even in a hotel room. Home is in Tony’s skin, and has been for a long time. And now it feels like his whole world has tipped upside down, and isn’t that ridiculous? He’s an airman. He’s seen combat, spent hours squinting into a too-bright sun. Spent days wondering what will happen next while his unit grew restless and reckless with the forced inaction. He’s spent the last few months balancing on a knifepoint and it’s now, it’s this that finally destabilises him and sends him tumbling.

He can’t reconcile those words with his worldview. Tony cheating doesn’t fit life as he knows it.

“I’m sorry,” Tony whispers behind him. “I’m– I was a mess, babe. I made stupid decisions. I thought you’d– I thought we broke up.”

“If you’d answered your phone you’d have known otherwise,” Jim says, and he’s surprised both at the words that come out and at the flatness of his tone. He doesn’t feel nearly as angry as he sounds. He feels lost, suffocated. He feels like the one bright point in his universe has suddenly dimmed and it hurts, even more than the cut-off, choked noise Tony makes in response hurts. He needs to find his balance, get on an even keel and work through this because otherwise he’s going to say something he regrets. Something he can’t come back from.

He hasn’t felt this awful since he snapped at Tony in the hotel room all those months ago, and put his fist through the wall. But even that hadn’t felt final. Not when Tony had always looked at him with a universe of emotion in his eyes and Jim knew it meant forever. He never expected forever to end in a stupid argument and too-long a separation.

“I’m going to have a shower,” he says, and he’s so grateful that his voice doesn’t shake.

“Rhodey?” Tony manages to put a million questions into those two syllables.

“I need time to think,” Jim says. “I’m going to have a shower. Then we can talk.”

It feels like something’s tearing in two when he stands up and walks out of the bedroom and into the bathroom. Probably just his heart.

He leans against the closed bathroom door for what feels like hours, Tony’s words whirling through his brain. ‘Then I cheated on you. Twice.’ The condom is still dangling, sticky and foul, from his hand—like evidence of Tony’s betrayal—and he shoves it into the waste basket so hard the lid falls off. He wants to smash something, cause damage and scream and rant like a toddler having a tantrum. If he keeps all of this boiling inside he’ll explode. Worse, he wants to cry. He can feel the hot lump in his throat and the prickle in his eyes and he just wants to let go and sob. A tear escapes and he draws in a deep breath and tries to compose himself.

The hot water clears his head a little when he steps under the shower spray—makes it so he can breathe without feeling like he’s about to choke. After so many military showers it’s nice to just stand and soak, let the heat permeate his muscles and slow the bouncing words in his brain.

‘Cheated.’

He can’t help but wonder about them, Tony’s anonymous lovers. Were they male? Female? One of each? Does twice mean that he’s slept with two people, or with one person two times? Did they get to see the way he completely falls apart when he’s getting close? Hear the slight whine in each panted breath?

He opens his eyes and tries to banish the mental image of Tony moaning and writhing under someone other than him. This isn’t helping, this possessive jealousy. He’s an engineer and an airman and he will approach this coolly and logically. Jim picks up the soap and begins washing.

He lathers the soap and scrubs quickly over his face and head—thank goodness his hair is still so short he doesn’t really have to fuss with shampoo—and tries to boil it all down to facts. He and Tony fought before Jim shipped out. It’s a cold, hard fact, no matter how much he wants to forget it. Jim winces as he replays some of the things he said. He can’t even remember what sparked the argument, only that it spiralled out of control until they were verbally tearing strips off of each other and Jim had put his fist through the wall out of sheer frustration. Nothing he remembers could be construed as ‘go away, I don’t want you anymore’ though.

Jim sighs and digs his fingers into the knotted muscles of his neck. There’s no point rehashing the old argument and trying to assign blame. Tony left, thinking they were over, and he has to take that as a fact no matter how much it hurts. He wishes he could go back in time and call Tony over and over again that night, instead of just leaving the one message, but that’s just as silly as focussing on the argument.

He scrubs down his body, fingers pressing against the tender spot high on his chest where Tony left a hickey. Another fact—Tony didn’t count what he did as cheating until Jim had told him that he didn’t think they’d broken up. It’s not like he’d snuck around behind Jim’s back, or done it to hurt him. And he hadn’t tried to hide it, either.

For a long moment, Jim wishes he had. He’s so tired, so drained, and he has this all over, bone deep ache that he’s been carrying for the last month. He wishes he were blissfully ignorant of anything that went on while he was away because then he could just enjoy the afterglow. He could have Tony in here with him, deliberately getting in each other’s way as they try to wash, laughing and talking and tasting the hint if soap on each other’s skin. Not Tony sitting waiting out there while he sulks in the shower. He tries for a moment to be irrationally angry. Not that Tony cheated—didn’t cheat, he reminds himself—but that he opened his mouth and dragged Jim down into feeling this gut-churning awfulness. But he can’t quite bring himself to feel more than hurt, anxiety and confusion.

He doesn’t linger over washing the rest of his body, and once he’s clean he stands under the water, head tilted back so that it hits his scalp but doesn’t run into his eyes. The exhaust fan in the bathroom isn’t coping with the steam, and it drifts in lazy clouds above his head. The mirror will be fogged up now, and the towels clammy, but he doesn’t turn the hot water down. It pounds against his head and runs into his ears and blocks the world away, like he’s trapped in a warm, white cocoon. Staring at the ceiling, Jim fantasises about drying off, getting dressed, and just walking out. He’s got leave, he’s free to do what he wants, and he can just walk out that door and go to a club and drown out Tony’s words with loud music and overpriced drinks. But even as he thinks it, Jim knows he won’t walk off. Even as he lingers in the shower rather than walk back into the bedroom and face Tony, he knows he can’t leave him right here, right now, thinking that everything is messed up between them again. He needs to get out there and they need to talk, and they need to put this behind them. He needs to apologise, not because he thinks he’s reacted badly, but because he wants Tony to know that it’s all right.

He doesn’t hear the door open, just sees the steam swirl in a little eddy from the draft, spiralling like a dance. He hears it close, though, and looks through the foggy glass to see Tony standing against the door, wearing only his shirt.

“You’ve been in here for nearly an hour,” he says.

Jim winces, he didn’t mean to hog the bathroom for so long, or to leave Tony waiting, sticky and uncomfortable.

“I’m sorry,” Tony says. There’s this sort of resigned note to his voice that hurts worse than ‘I cheated on you’. Like Tony’s apologising but has no hope for forgiveness.

Jim opens the shower door. “Come here.”

“I’m sorry,” Tony says again.

Jim steps out from under the shower and reaches towards him. “No, _I’m_  sorry. Please, come here?”

Tony shrugs the shirt off quickly, hangs it on the back of the door, and then steps into the shower. His skin is cold, and his eyes are a little red like he’s been crying, and Jim wants to wrap him up and never let go. “I’m sorry,” he whispers, pressing kisses into the top of Tony’s shoulder. “I’m sorry I reacted like that. I just needed time to process.”

Tony’s arms finally move, coming around Jim’s waist and then they’re hugging properly. He tucks his face into Jim’s neck and presses a kiss there. “I’m sorry too,” he says, only just loud enough to be heard over the shower. “I’m sorry I thought we were over. I’m sorry I didn’t find a better way to tell you. And I am sorry I cheated. I was lonely, and I missed you, and I was thinking about you too much. I wish I’d just, I don’t know, I wish I’d been able to call you.”

Jim tugs him under the water and Tony comes easily. He slides his hands up and down the wet skin of Tony’s back and tries to blink back the sudden prickling in his eyes. He feels like he’s messed up over and over again with each letter he sent that didn’t end in ‘I love you’.

The words get stuck in his throat but he forces them out, choked and almost too quiet under the rush of the water. “You didn’t cheat. It doesn’t count.”

“I’m still sorry,” Tony says.

Jim cups Tony’s face and turns it to face him, and stops his words with a kiss. “No,” he says, still so close his lips brush Tony’s, his hands holding the younger man still. “Don’t be. Please don’t be.”

He takes a deep, shuddering breath and presses his forehead against Tony’s. “Well. This sucks.”

Tony laughs, forced and hollow. “I know. It was supposed to be a nice welcome home for you. I messed it all up.”

“It’s okay,” Jim tells him, though it really isn’t. “It’s not really your fault. We did have a pretty awful fight before I left.”

“It’s how Aaron and I broke up,” Tony says. “He didn’t punch a wall, though.”

“Probably a good thing,” Jim says, trying to keep the irrational jealousy out of his voice. Aaron and Tony were over long before Jim and Tony started dating, there’s no reason for it to bother him. “It would have been our apartment wall he broke.”

“Or his hand,” Tony says.

Rhodey smiles for a moment, and sobers again. “So, the condom?” he has to ask.

Tony pulls away, putting as much space between the two of them as he can manage in the tiny shower stall. He won’t meet Jim’s eyes, and Jim feels sick, icy fear in his stomach. They used a condom, but Tony blew him bare, and he can’t remember whether or not that’s supposed to be safe. “Have you been tested?” he asks, before Tony can say anything.

“No,” Tony says.

“Shit, Tony,” Jim groans. He reaches for Tony’s waist and tugs him closer again. “Promise me you will, okay?”

“Okay,” Tony mumbles. He shuffles closer to Jim and presses his face into the crook between Jim’s neck and shoulder. “We’re okay, aren’t we?”

Jim wraps one arm around Tony’s shoulders and cups the back of his head with the other hand. “Yeah, I think we’re okay.”


End file.
